


One Last Chance to Take it All Back

by GallifreyanAtHearts



Category: Bandom, Cobra Starship, The Academy Is...
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-13
Updated: 2014-11-13
Packaged: 2018-02-25 05:11:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2609726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GallifreyanAtHearts/pseuds/GallifreyanAtHearts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first thing he notices is that it is 2:27AM and the second thing he notices is that it is Gabe calling him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Last Chance to Take it All Back

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in two days while listening exclusively to Blank Space by Taylor Swift. I'm exhausted and this isn't proofread. Title pulled from TAI...'s LAX to O'Hare.

Bill rolls over in bed, away from the nightstand where his phone is ringing loudly.  It’s too dark for it to be his alarm, meaning someone is actually calling him at this ungodly hour.  When the phone does not quiet, he turns back toward it and reaches an arm from the warmth of the covers to grab the device.  The first thing he notices is that it is 2:27AM and the second thing he notices is that it is Gabe calling him.

Bill puts the phone down in front of his face and watches it ring.  Gabe hasn’t called him sober in years, but every so often he’ll get drunken calls or voicemails, filled with slurred declarations of love and adoration and quiet confessions of mistakes made.  All the things Bill wants to hear that Gabe is too afraid to say sober.

The screen goes dark for a moment as the call goes to voicemail, but almost immediately begins to ring again.  Bill sighs and swipes his finger across the screen.

“Hi, Gabe.”

“I need you.”  Bill rolls his eyes at Gabe’s words.

“Of course you do.”  He says impatiently.

“No, I mean I really need you to do me a favor.”  There is an urgency in Gabe’s voice that Bill hadn’t picked up on, and he doesn’t sound shitfaced.

“You’re kidding, right?”  Bill hangs up on Gabe with that.  Bill does favors for his friends.  Friends who call him.  Friends who are involved in his life.  Not ex-lovers who flirt with him on twitter and ignore him in real life.

But Bill stares at the phone, waiting for the screen to come to life again.  Gabe doesn’t disappoint.

“Now that that is out of your system, _please_ can you do me a fucking favor?”  Is what Gabe says when Bill answers the phone for the second time.

“You think that you’re off the hook for years of being a dick because I hung up on you once!?”  Bill’s voice cracks into a sleepy shout.  He hangs up again.

Bill doesn’t even have time to put the phone down before it rings again.

“For fuck’s sake what’s so important that you’re breaking years of silence?”  Bill asks.  Gabe is quiet on the other end.  “Spit it out, Gabriel, because I have no qualms about hanging up on you again.”

“I need you to pick me up from O’Hare.”  Gabe says softly after a moment.

“Call Pete.”  Bill says without compassion.

“Pete’s why I’m here.  But my flight from JFK was delayed; I was supposed to arrive hours ago.  I can’t disturb him this late.”  Gabe says this in a rush.

“But you can disturb me?”  Bill asks.

“I… I mean I literally cannot disturb him.  Have you ever tried to wake that man up?”  Bill nearly laughs before catching himself.

“Fine.  Whatever.  What terminal?”

“Terminal 3.  JetBlue.”

“Got it.”  Bill sighs again.  He doesn’t understand why Gabe has always been able to wrap Bill around his finger the way he does, the way he mentions jumping and Bill is already asking how high.

“Oh, and Bill?”  Gabe says as Bill is about to hang up.

“Hm?”

“I’m going to need some place to stay tonight.”

“Not a snowball’s chance in Hell.  See you at the airport.”  Bill hangs up on Gabe for the third time.

Bill pulls on a pair of pants and digs around for a hoodie, but doesn’t bother with much else.  Of course it is appropriate for him to be thinking of Gabe just now, but it still annoys him how Gabe just sticks in his head absorbing all his thoughts, all his loneliness, his anger, and his delight.  He hates that though it’s been years, Gabe still has this power over him.

The streets are deserted as Bill drives.  Bill notices that his car is due for an inspection, and has his phone set a reminder for tomorrow.  He can’t find anything else to distract him though, so he reluctantly thinks about Gabe.

It’s not fair.  Why does he think he just gets to show up in Bill’s life again?  Needing ridiculous favors, no less.

Bill nearly misses the exit for O’Hare.  He changes lanes quickly and makes it and pays closer attention to the poorly marked airport roads.

And despite it all, there’s a tight knot of anticipation in the pit of his stomach, a nervous energy, the desire, the _need_ to see Gabe.  On some annoying level, he’s pleased.

When he sees Gabe standing outside the terminal, he takes a deep breathe to steady himself and pulls over to the curb.  He stops the car and pops the trunk for Gabe’s luggage.  He doesn’t get out to help Gabe, though.

He doesn’t look at Gabe when he gets into the passenger seat.

“Hi, Bilvy.”  Gabe says as Bill starts the car.

“Gabe.”  Bill’s voice is toneless, gives away nothing.

“Sorry for waking you up.”  Gabe says, but then is silent.

It’s too quiet, but Bill doesn’t feel right turning on music.  His fingers tighten on the steering wheel.

“Bill.  William.”  Gabe says his name like it’s new, like it tastes unfamiliar on his tongue.  Bill is determined not to look; he keeps his focus on the road.

“Yes, Gabe?”  Bill’s voice wavers on the syllable of Gabe’s name.

“I’m sorry.”  Bill turns to look at Gabe who is looking intently at him, almost pleadingly.

“I know you are.”  Bill admits, turning back to the road.  Bill also knows that Gabe is no longer apologizing for waking him up.

There is no more conversation for the duration of the drive, but Bill brings Gabe to his apartment, and helps him drag his suitcase up the stairs.

It’s the first time that Gabe has seen this apartment, nicer than the one he’d lived in back then.  Bill lets Gabe drop his suitcase in the guest room.

“You can stay here tonight.  Then you can leave in the morning.”  Bill instructs.

“Yessir.”  Gabe says, sitting on the bed.

“Great.  Bathroom is at the end of the hall.  Goodnight.”  Bill leaves the room, everything inside him a gnarled mess.

This is Gabe.  And that excites and thrills some part of Bill, just as Gabe always does and always has.  Gabe is _here_ in his _apartment_ and that part of Bill urges him to forgive Gabe.  He wants to so bad.  And yet he knows it’s an awful idea.  He stands outside the guest room door until he feels a hand on his shoulder.

He turns to see Gabe standing right behind him.

“Bilvy…”  Gabe says.  Bill stares, not knowing what to say, _never_ knowing what to say, what to _do_ , how to _stop_ it when Gabe takes Bill’s face in his hands and kisses him, and not _wanting_ to stop it.

When Gabe pulls back, Bill continues to stare.

“God fucking damn it, Bill, say something.”  Gabe says.

Bill just stares, his insides exploding with Gabe, the fireworks that Gabe’s kisses always set off in his chest, the anger, loneliness, and resentment of years bursting and mixing with euphoria and adoration; the man he is now meeting the teenager he was when he first met Gabe within his emotions.

“Tell me how to fix us.”  Gabe whispers, still holding Bill’s face, his forehead nearly touching Bill’s.

“You can’t.”  Bill says, but barely, like he can’t bear to say the words, and he can’t.  And then he kisses Gabe, trying to communicate with no words everything that he has felt about Gabe, from the very beginning until now.

And then they’re stumbling into Bill’s bedroom, adjacent to the guest room.  Kissing, gripping each other, they sit on the bed, Bill’s bed, a new one, bought after he moved here, a bed they’ve never fucked on.  And Gabe is pushing Bill back onto the pillows but Bill is shaking his head.

“I don’t want to.”  Bill says, and like that Gabe is off of him.

“I’m sorry.  That was stupid of me.  You’ve made your feelings very clear.”  Gabe says, already off of the bed, not looking at Bill.

“I would have stopped you sooner if you were doing something I didn’t want you to.  Besides, I kissed you the second time.”  Bill says, staring at Gabe again, and Gabe shifts his weight.

“Yeah, but it was still my fault.  I should know better than to put you in a position where you might say no if you were able to say no to me at all.”  Gabe smiles sadly and some sort of anxious, anticipatory thrill shoots through Bill, because this is the first indication he’s ever had that Gabe knows what kind of power he holds over Bill.

“I just did, didn’t I?”  Bill says.

“I guess you did.”  Gabe finally looks at Bill.

“I’m not an infatuated teenager anymore, Gabe.  I haven’t been for a very long time.  I can make my own decisions.”  Bill crosses his arms over his chest.

“I know.”  Gabe looks away again.  “I’m sorry.”  He glances at Bill briefly.  “Goodnight, I guess.”

Gabe is almost to the door when Bill stops him by calling his name.

“What?”  Gabe’s eyes are sad.

“I miss you.”  It takes all of Bill’s willpower to say that, to admit to that.  Bill holds his breath as Gabe walks back toward him and sits on the bed.

“I miss you, too.”  Bill inhales the sound of the words.

“I know.  Hold me.”  Gabe just nods, wrapping his arms around Bill.  Gabe is warm and smells like airport.  “Stay here tonight?”  Bill asks into Gabe’s shoulder.

“Yeah.”  Gabe says, and Bill moves back into the bed, lying down on his side and allowing Gabe to lie next to him before curling up into Gabe’s chest.

It just feels natural, like this is the right place for him to be, but Bill could just throw up.  He knows this shouldn’t happen, that it’ll only lead to feeling worse in the future.  But right now is so wonderful and part of him wouldn’t miss it for the world.

Falling asleep in Gabe’s arms is easy.

Waking up there is not.

Gabe is already awake when Bill wakes up and for a sleepy moment Bill feels warm and safe, as if this was any morning with Gabe.

And the events of the previous night crash down on him.  He opens his eyes to see Gabe smiling softly at him.  And it nearly kills him to open his mouth and say his next words.

“You need to leave.”  His voice is hoarse with sleep and he watches Gabe’s face fall.

“Yeah.  Of course.”  Gabe’s voice is softer even than Bill’s.  “But you’re gonna need to let go of me first, Bilvy.”

Bill doesn’t.  So Gabe doesn’t move.

“I’m sorry.”  Gabe says.  Bill stares again, not sure why.

And Gabe stares back.  For endless minutes that could be days or weeks or years, just staring at each other before Bill mumbles something unintelligible.

“What was that?”  Gabe asks.

“Say it.  All that shit that you would never say when you were sober.”  Bill’s voice trembles.

“What?”  Gabe looks away from Bill, quite a feat, because he is still holding Bill against his chest.

“You asked me how you could fix us.”  Bill says.  Bill knows that what he’s doing, what he’s saying is wrong, and that he _can’t_ forgive Gabe because he knows that in a year from now he will be in the same miserable place.

“You said that I couldn’t.”  Gabe reminds Bill softly.

“Yeah, well I lied.”  Bill says.  Gabe is silent and Bill’s heartbeat is overwhelmingly loud in his ears, and he feels sick with anticipation and dread.

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Bill.”  Gabe is lying, they both know it.  Without so much as a sigh, Bill frees himself from Gabe’s arms and rolls away.

“You can leave now.”  He instructs, not looking at Gabe.

He feels the bed shift as Gabe gets up and Bill doesn’t allow himself to look as Gabe leaves the room, doesn’t even move until he hears the front door close behind him as he leaves.  He rolls over and buries his face in the pillows.

They smell like airport and Gabe.


End file.
